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Hi,

Anyone with any experience playing Abaddon? He is a very cool character, and I was thinking of doing a conversion of him, like this rather excellent and simple one I found on Dakka
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/488591.page

And I made up this army list for him:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/573616.page

Now, all that remains is advice on how to play him. Is he any good..? I mean he seems badass, but costs the same as a very kitted out daemon prince. So what does he do best? I was thinking Terminator bodyguard for him, either BL Bringers of despair expensive ones, or just normal ones in a Codex CSM list.

Probably on foot..

Thanks for any advice.

Per your list, I think having Slaanesh termi's is a pro. Swap for HFlamer and pick up FnP for you most expensive unit. Footslogging or DS your going to need to be able to soak fire, and each model is pricey. Also, keep 1 chainfist and lose the other PFist. Abby is going to eliminate damn near everything in HtH, and a chump sergeant will help you pick and choose challenges.

Your Oblits have a decent chance of downing a flyer with checks, between 2 Assault Cannons and 2 Autocannons a turn. I wouldn't worry too much about it as is.

Tl;dr
Termi
-Chainfist (12) -MoK +MoS -Reaper +HFlamer +Icon Excess.

Abby will own challenges, and eat squads. Your terminators are slow, so expect your opponent to dance away from his squad at every opportunity. I usually say don't, but maybe DS him to force the other guy to react to him, otherwise I see you spending a lot of time walking around for nothing.

Alternately, take no marks on the termies, keep the reaper AC, lose the HtH weapons entirely and add another body and 1-2 combi-weapons. Use them as a mobile firebase and use Abby to deter and CC options.

Best option: 30 Cultist. No options. Walk Abbaddon right up the gut with 30 ablative wounds right at his artillery/pathfinders/Dev squads etc. Saves you ~130 pts. Add in a 3 man Termicide squad with just Combi Meltas for 105 pts. Now your 25 pts in the green, have 30 wounds on Abbadon, and have a 3man anti armor squad. No one is shooting at your troops with a termicide and an Abby-mob to deal with.

Or lose the 3 man squad and add an Aegis with Quad for AA.
Or 4 Spawn to screen for your cultist. Cover saves for 26 of you!

I've had recent luck with belakor + land raider. The raider moves up and pops smoke + receives invis. Most armies wont be able to kill that turn one. Then you just move up again and jump out and hopefully assault.

Abbadon/typhus + termies or marines in the raider. You can also use (nurgle)spawn.

At such a small 1250 points limit, its unfortunate that you cant afford the land raider. land Raiders are so hard to kill for most armies barring just a lucky shot (and hey...that happens!)

Hes a beast. A khorne unit with banner to accompany him really helps. re-rolling charge distance can be huge.

I've played against him in a Terminator unit with a Land Raider and he was so distracting and hard to kill that I spent my entire time trying to snipe him with Lascannons that the rest of the CSM army ate me for lunch.

So, in my experience he's pretty scary to play against. He also munches anything his unit can catch0--they are slow, though.

He is spendy but he wins any close combat he fights in. He used to have trouble with swarm lord but not anymore (after latest codex nerf).

Theres 2 ways I've fielded him:
Abaddon + 3 obliterators (MoN) + lord/sorc in power Armour in landraider. Jump out of the landraider and split off the lord and charge with the main unit first. That way the lord can still sweeping advance and can challenge if the opponents have a sergeant.
or
Abaddon + 35 cultists
or (something I would like to try)
Abaddon + 35 cultists with MoT as allies to Tzeentch chaos daemons (buff them with the 4++ psychic power for storm shields all round!).

Thanks for all the good suggestions and feedback! The consensus seems to be he's a beast and worth it, if you can get him into CC..

The cultist idea is very cool. However since I wanted t field a Black Legion themed army, I feel they are way too puny and unsignificant for Abaddon to mess around with. The best for the best!
The obliterator idea is cool too. But I can't squeeze in a Land raider at this points level. Adding one would be a very easy way of reaching 1500 though.

I did an updated version of the orginal list, based on the MoS + Icon idea, to give Abaddon and his unit Feel no pain. It's just to evil not to try.

To get the points I acutally ended up removing the terminator heavy weapon altogher, instead of swapping the reaper for a heavy flamer. That feels pretty good though, as a template weapon seems a waste of BS5 (in the case of the bringers of despair which I wanted to field), but mostly because I want them in CC and a HF might actually kill enough closest models so I fail the charge.. Definitely more survivable this way, but not convinced FnP is worth more than an extra attack for the whole unit in the first turn. But then again getting there is going to be hard as any opponent is likely to focus everything on them, and rightly so..


Abaddon and the Harbringers of despair v2- Black Legion 1250

Abaddon
265

5 terminators
the Bringers of despair (WS5, BS5)
3 combi meltas
chainfist
mark of slaanesh
icon of excess
VoTLW
289

10 CSM, ccw+bp
2 meltaguns, 1 combi-melta
mark of khorne
VoTLW
200

10 CSM, boltguns (sonic blaster count as)
2 plasma guns (blastmaster count as)
VoTLW
180

2 obliterators, mark of nurgle, VoTLW
158

2 obliterators, mark of nurgle, VoTLW
158

1250

For 289 you could get 9 terminators all with power axes and combi bolters (comes as standard). The best thing about chaos terminators is that they are so cheap. If you are going to footslog as terminators, bring 10 and run them every turn instead of shooting, they are there to get abaddon into combat and soak up fire so the more bodies the better.

There are very few things that can handle abbadon once he gets where he's going. I think Deathwing knights can with smite mode, but they're expensive. And there is an iron hands chaptermaster build from the supplement that looks hella killy, who some people said can fight him.

i dont know if a 500+ beatstick mob is worth it at 1250 points level. Half your army is abbadon+his terminators which really limits your shooting and speed. (You have max 4 lascannon shots as long range hi str shooting).

I think youre better off dropping the terminators and taking belakor or a land raider. Belakor honestly is just as strong in CC as abbadon but has dank psychic powers and can fly so doesnt need a transport. or run abbadon in a squad of cultists so you can contest stuff and still destroy in CC. Terminators without a land raider or termicide loadouts are just so meh. Also mark of khorne and VotLW on CSM squads might be a waste. Theyre going to have to stay around objectives anyway. Floot slogging i doubt they see combat often.

Dlr : VotLW and khorne marks might be a waste. Run abby with cultists instead of terminators. Use points on extra shooting a heldrake or a land raider.